HHN 2024: News & Info

[thehorrorlover]

just imagine you wait a 180 min for insidious and it is your first time and workers are yelling at you to keep it moving
but you just want to enjoy the maze since you live in Orlando

 

[Lc.]

Hell, even Terror Tram this year, I STILL encounter the keep moving. There have been times where it'd be nearly dead so naturally I'm not going to "rush" through. When it is a full tram dump, I'll linger a bit to let the masses go first because it's less enjoyable & the flow of guests gets clogged up easily. Terror Tram has always had an issue with their ops people. Especially when it's dead & you pause for 2sec to grab a photo of something or someone, they act like it's the end of the world despite no other guests being present.

I am so tempted to just wait, stop at a certain point on the tram during a dead walk thru, and just do one of these while they say "Keep Moving"

mind it for experimental reasons.

 

[DTH]

Another issue is the lack of communication the ops & scareactors have. There have been a few times this year I've seen ops trying to get guests into the house despite a cast change in progress resulting in multiple rooms being devoid of scareactors. It wouldn't have hurt the line to make guests wait 3min before sending them in.

For me this is ESSENTIAL. Nobody and I mean NOBODY wants to wait hours just to go through a maze with ZERO scareactors in it. I don't even want to wait 5 minutes and for that to happen. If it means waiting an extra min or 2, we will understand. You could even announce it and people will go "oh okay." Sometimes grasping what the hold up is will make people get it. Kinda like when you go to a store and the cashier says "sorry, my register is down, just need to reboot it."

 

[chris.g]

Kind of starting to realize logistically HHN has seemed to go backwards since 21....

 

[Wesker69]

I flat out had one of the ops at Eternal Bloodlines tell me they don't communicate with the Scareactors or their leads/supervisors.

This shocked me because when I worked H4 staff in 2018, we would hold the line so scareactors could swap out. Hell, we had a screen to know when to send the next wave of guests in. It was a conga line, but not terrible.

Sending guests into an empty house was not on our "to do" list, except that one night when It POURED & we "had" to stay open due to being so close to guest relations. We had maybe 5 scareactors on set. It was awful. And wet. Cold. Did I mention wet? *sigh*

 

[Spookies n' Stuff]

Another issue is the lack of communication the ops & scareactors have. There have been a few times this year I've seen ops trying to get guests into the house despite a cast change in progress resulting in multiple rooms being devoid of scareactors. It wouldn't have hurt the line to make guests wait 3min before sending them in.

Probably too expensive to impliment, but it would be nice if there could be some kind of system akin to standard ride vehicle location indicators at dispatch where actors have basically a switch in their boo hole that they can activate to indicate to a monitor the hosts at the front of the line or supervisor have that they're in position, and can switch off when their break begins, so if a large chunk of sensors indicate that a shift change is in progress, they can halt the line for a minute or two to let them swap out.
No idea if this is technically possible or feasible, given I doubt it would tangibly improve conditions enough to justify the cost from a profit standpoint, but I imagine it would be a good quality of life improvement for guests and ops.

 

[Wesker69]

Probably too expensive to impliment, but it would be nice if there could be some kind of system akin to standard ride vehicle location indicators at dispatch where actors have basically a switch in their boo hole that they can activate to indicate to a monitor the hosts at the front of the line or supervisor have that they're in position, and can switch off when their break begins, so if a large chunk of sensors indicate that a shift change is in progress, they can halt the line for a minute or two to let them swap out.

Completely unnecessary. There are security cameras throughout the entire house. And as we've all seen, there are ops scattered throughout the entire house. All it takes is minimal communication between the Scareactor & Ops leads/staff.

The fact that their poor handling of express vs GA pulsing (and the obnoxious "keep moving" during dead times) is a clear indicator that they lack proper training.

 

[DTH]

But imagine an indicator app of some sort on a tablet. Is communication great? Sure. But convenience is easier to implement. Less room for human error or worse, apathy to the system or total neglect. “Scareactor capacity just dropped below 85%, let’s hold the line….okay, it reached 95%, come on through.” And it’s trainable and easier to supervise. “You let people in when the indicator was at 50%, never do that again.” Or “hey folks, we have a lot of scareactors out today, let’s go ahead and set 75% as our total cap number, so even 65% will work for today.” It can change daily, hourly, or even moment to moment. “Guys the line reached three hours, let’s just push people through and hope for the best to slim it down.” An automated message board with status updates would be great too. “STOP LETTING IN EXPRESS, THEY CAN WAIT FOR 5 MINS.”

 

[Wesker69]

“STOP LETTING IN EXPRESS, THEY CAN WAIT FOR 5 MINS.”

Will this be a new shirt sold at HHN 2025? @Brian G.

 

[Spookies n' Stuff]

But imagine an indicator app of some sort on a tablet. Is communication great? Sure. But convenience is easier to implement. Less room for human error or worse, apathy to the system or total neglect. “Scareactor capacity just dropped below 85%, let’s hold the line….okay, it reached 95%, come on through.” And it’s trainable and easier to supervise. “You let people in when the indicator was at 50%, never do that again.” Or “hey folks, we have a lot of scareactors out today, let’s go ahead and set 75% as our total cap number, so even 65% will work for today.” It can change daily, hourly, or even moment to moment. “Guys the line reached three hours, let’s just push people through and hope for the best to slim it down.” An automated message board with status updates would be great too. “STOP LETTING IN EXPRESS, THEY CAN WAIT FOR 5 MINS.”

Yeah, obviously I don't personally have experience, but having a bunch of numbered positions with green or red dots feels a lot easier for ops to see on the fly and make fast line changes compared to trying to sus out who's where in 20 small windows monochrome nightvision footage while guests are also passing.
It likely is just an expense thing like I mentioned though, it's objectively cheaper to use the existing cameras for security and ops purposes rather than separating them into cameras for security and indicators for ops, even if it would potentially make things cleaner.

 

[Wesker69]

Just train staff better (read that express fine print that says "not immediate access") & communicate, it's all they really need to do.

Oh.. today's Thursday. Wonder what fresh hell awaits!

 

[Jake S]

Yeah, this is an ongoing problem across theme park operations. The trickiest part of working the "tower" position at Haunted Mansion is when and how to tell guests to stop doing any manner of things, from the stuff you're all thinking of to the more routine (flash photography). Ideally, you do your best to discern if using the voice of god is going to improve the ride experience for all guests or if it serves to be more disruptive than allowing a guest to "get away with" one bad action.

Good leads and trainers teach employees to seek that balance. The bad ones, typically resentful of guests, are more interested in telling someone to "stop" rather than maintaining a good guest experience.

 

[Michael S]

Will say that was an issue opening weekend as well. My partner and I walked through an empty house and were told to keep moving, but didn’t think it was much of a problem. Don’t mean to be a Karen but I wish this was something I complained about.

That’s a bummer to hear. Even tho I’m kind of numb to the scares, my trick is that I always just kind of walk real slow and act like I’m anxious about entering each room. I know scare actors will read that too, so I usually get most of the scares, as well.

When they tell me to keep moving, which I have encountered a few times in the past, I’ll just blurt out “I’m nervous.” Not much they can do about that excuse! lol

 

[Wesker69]

When they tell me to keep moving, which I have encountered a few times in the past, I’ll just blurt out “I’m nervous.” Not much they can do about that excuse! lol

"IT'S MY FIRST TIME! DON'T RUSH ME!"
"Didn't you just go through this... twice?"
"NOT WITH THIS CAST!"

 

[Spookies n' Stuff]

Just train staff better (read that express fine print that says "not immediate access") & communicate, it's all they really need to do.

I imagine even with more extensive training, if the higher ups throw out an email or a walkie talkie call to your supervisor that says "the lines are too long let more people in or we'll cause problems" or "express guests are upset that they have to wait 5 minutes instead of -20 for a 2 hour long line" all that training kinda goes out the window in favor of that demand, and that's more or less what I imagine is going on. In my experience no matter what the realities of operations are and how many actors you have in place or how well you're pacing the line, demands from the people above your supervisor end up with having to screw over whoever they ask to be screwed over (usually the lower employees or whichever guests are paying the least to be there).
I lost count of the nights my supervisor had to keep begging the hosts to keep pushing people through because their bosses demanded the wait time drop even though the conga already backed up to a standstill inside the maze 4 times within the last hour.

 

[Wesker69]

Maybe they wanted the bodies to hit the floor rather than capacity?

.....or that's just The Purge show

 

[Michael S]

I lost count of the nights my supervisor had to keep begging the hosts to keep pushing people through because their bosses demanded the wait time drop even though the conga already backed up to a standstill inside the maze 4 times within the last hour.

When they tell me to keep moving, which I have encountered a few times in the past, I’ll just blurt out “I’m nervous.” Not much they can do about that excuse! lol

 

[Sydney]

I flat out had one of the ops at Eternal Bloodlines tell me they don't communicate with the Scareactors or their leads/supervisors.

This shocked me because when I worked H4 staff in 2018, we would hold the line so scareactors could swap out. Hell, we had a screen to know when to send the next wave of guests in. It was a conga line, but not terrible.

Sending guests into an empty house was not on our "to do" list, except that one night when It POURED & we "had" to stay open due to being so close to guest relations. We had maybe 5 scareactors on set. It was awful. And wet. Cold. Did I mention wet? *sigh*

Cast changes are very different here than in Orlando. Here, it’s on each individual cast member to be in their position on time but no one is really checking closely - no organized group cast changes even now with actors on Cast A/Cast B schedule. Not to mention that many actors also have to pass through guest walkways and time their entrance out to be as subtle as possible, which also can cause delays if there is a conga line present. Speaking from personal experience after working HHN 2021-2022.

 

[Jerroddragon]

If you don't want Conga Lines and have an AP for Six Flags then go there

Its not a perfect event but if most Thursday are as slow as last night you can literally walk into houses with ZERO other guests in them and enjoy houses

 

[Wesker69]

Cast changes are very different here than in Orlando. Here, it’s on each individual cast member to be in their position on time but no one is really checking closely - no organized group cast changes even now with actors on Cast A/Cast B schedule. Not to mention that many actors also have to pass through guest walkways and time their entrance out to be as subtle as possible, which also can cause delays if there is a conga line present. Speaking from personal experience after working HHN 2021-2022.

Yea. Again. Hi.. worked as USH staff. Fully aware of how it's done, but again.. if you have good communication with the ops staff there is no issue.

A good ops person will hold guests in place to allow a scareactor to pass rather than "keep moving".